Kevin Fox Gotham

• PhD
• Professor at Tulane University

This paper investigates whether perceptions of neighborhood physical disorder—measured by vacant lots, vacant buildings, and overgrown vegetation—influence perceptions of crime and perceptions of the frequency or magnitude of crime events. We use ordinal logistic regression to analyze individual-level and contextual-level variables derived from a s...

Over the decades, the social and behavioral sciences have become increasingly integral to the assessment of crime foreseeability in criminal and civil court cases. This paper uses case examples from litigation involving convenience stores and gas stations to describe the analytical steps of a forensic criminological investigation to assess crime fo...

This study advances scholarly debate on the impact of confidence and trust on flood risk perceptions using data from a random sample of 403 residents in New Orleans, a U.S. coastal city with hundreds of miles of levees to protect the city from flooding. The research focuses on several predictors including specific trust measures of local, state, an...

This paper draws on data and evidence from a premises security lawsuit to illustrate the security challenges of formulating, implementing, and enforcing parental/youth escort policies in shopping malls. While there is some diversity in terms of content and implementation, parental/youth escort policies typically require teenagers under a specific a...

This paper describes the use and application of environmental criminology and social science methods in court cases involving allegations of negligent security. Negligent security is an area of premises liability that involves claims against business owners for damages or injuries on their property due to a lack of security precautions against reas...

This chapter identifies climate change adaptation measures implemented in post-Sandy New York City and post-Katrina New Orleans and examines their conflictual and contradictory dynamics and impacts. Climate change adaption measures aim to reduce existing and future climate change risks and enhance adaptive capacity. The chapter begins with an intro...

This paper advances scholarly debate on the contradictions of environmental risk management measures by analyzing the determinants of flood insurance coverage among a sample of 403 residents in New Orleans, a city undergoing rapid transformation due to post-Katrina rebuilding efforts and anthropogenic modifications of climate, hydrology, and ecolog...

Urbanization refers to the physical, demographic, and economic growth of cities. The term also implies the concentration of people and social activities into settlement patterns characterized by high‐density land development. The study of cities and urbanization has a rich tradition in the arts, humanities, and social and natural sciences. Modern t...

In this chapter, we analyze several expert witness reports to explain how a forensic criminologist might address issues related to breach of duty, violation of standards of care, and causation related to claims involving administrative negligence, respondeat superior, and vicarious liability. We first address claims of negligent training and superv...

Spectacle is a major concept scholars use to theorize and analyze emergent forms of urban redevelopment, entertainment, and tourism events and activities. This essay reviews current scholarship on the different conceptualizations of spectacle and highlights the burgeoning scholarship on the sociospatial impacts and consequences of the proliferation...

This paper uses a case study of the Lower Ninth Ward neighborhood in New Orleans to examine the relationships between green tourism and sustainability discourse in shaping the post-Katrina rebuilding process. Specially, we draw on long-term ethnographic field observations to highlight the tensions between abstract and idealized conceptions of susta...

This chapter investigates the questions of foreseeability, standards of care, and causation in negligent security claims pertaining to workplace violence. We first identify the various types of workplace violence and discuss current research on the extent, costs, and causes of workplace violence incidents. We then present a case of sexual assault i...

Cet article présente un aperçu et une évaluation de mon concept de gentrification touristique. J’y décris les raisons qui m’ont amené à développer ce concept et je détaille les sources qui m’ont inspiré cette théorisation du tourisme en tant que moteur et produit essentiels des phénomènes touristiques. J’y discute ensuite les diverses réactions du...

This article provides an overview and assessment of my concept of tourism gentrification. I describe my motivation for developing the concept and elaborate on the sources of inspiration for my theorizing of tourism as a major driver and outcome of gentrification trends. I next discuss the various scholarly reactions to my concept and delineate the...

Questo articolo fornisce una panoramica e una valutazione del mio concetto di gentrificazione turistica. Innanzitutto, presenterò le motivazioni che mi hanno spinto a sviluppare il concetto e approfondirò le fonti che mi hanno condotto a teorizzare il turismo come principale motore e risultato delle tendenze della gentrificazione. In seguito spiegh...

Flood hazards are a serious and growing threat to the health and welfare of residents in cities and rural areas around the world. This cross-sectional study uses a sample of 383 residents living in seven New Orleans, Louisiana, neighborhoods to examine the effect of experiential, sociodemographic, and socioeconomic factors on flood risk perceptions...

This paper develops the concept touristic disaster as a heuristic device to examine the conflictual and contradictory aspects of showcasing disaster-devastated neighborhoods as tourist attractions. Touristic disaster refers to the application of tourism modes of staging, visualization, and discourse to reenchant the money making deterrents (stigma)...

This article investigates the determinants of flood risk perceptions in New Orleans, Louisiana (United States), a deltaic coastal city highly vulnerable to seasonal nuisance flooding and hurricane-induced deluges and storm surges. Few studies have investigated the influence of hazard experience, geophysical vulnerability (hazard proximity), and ris...

Although many studies have examined the effects of structural factors and institutional interests on risk estimation practices, little is known about the political dynamics surrounding divergent responses to risk reduction measures. This article examines the political economy of risk reduction, using a case study of Louisiana's coastal restoration...

This paper engages sociological research on the political economy of the environment to decipher the contradictions and crisis tendencies associated with coastal restoration, using a case study of southern Louisiana. The paper explores the antinomies or contradictions of risk reduction measures (e.g., coastal restoration) in an extractive economy d...

World's fairs or international expositions are short term attractions officially organized by a nation‐state, with exhibits, pavilions, tourist venues, and other spectacular displays of socioeconomic progress, technological development, and cultural advancement. World's Fairs are exemplary mega‐events that have a spectacular character, mass popular...

Dark tourism is the circulation of people to places characterized by distress, atrocity, or sadness and pain. As a more specific component of dark tourism, “disaster tourism” denotes situations where the tourism product is generated within, and from, the aftermath of a major disaster or traumatic event. Examples of dark tourism include guided tours...

Over the past two decades, federal block grants and spatially targeted tax subsidies have become popular forms of federal assistance to disaster-affected areas. This article provides an overview and critical evaluation of the impact of the Gulf Opportunity Zone and the Community Development Block Grant–Disaster Recovery program in the years after H...

This paper uses a case study of the Lower Ninth Ward neighborhood in New Orleans to examine the relationships between green tourism and sustainability discourse in shaping the post-Katrina rebuilding process. Specially, we draw on long-term ethnographic field observations to highlight the tensions between abstract and idealized conceptions of susta...

In this article I trace the mutation of the enterprise zone model into a post-disaster recovery tool, using a case of the implementation of the Gulf Opportunity (GO) Zone in Louisiana. From 2006 to 2011, the GO Zone program provided tax incentives to individuals and businesses in the United States Gulf Coast area affected by Hurricanes Katrina and...

This paper contributes to scholarship on the relationship between financialisation and the production of urban space by examining the implementation of the Gulf Opportunity (GO) Zone Act of 2005 (Pub. L. No. 109–135). From 2005 to December 2011, the GO Zone provided over $23 billion in tax-free, low-interest bonds and other tax incentives to indivi...

This article examines the interlocking nature of racialization and rescaling in post-Katrina New Orleans, focusing specifically on the implementation of the Louisiana Road Home program, the largest housing recovery program in US history. Based on interviews and long-term ethnographic fieldwork, I conceptualize the Road Home program as a racialized...

Over the last two decades, the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program has repeatedly been adapted as a vehicle to respond to federal disasters, such as floods, hurricanes, and terrorist strikes. In this article, I describe the use of the CDBG program for disaster recovery, identify changes in rules governing the use of special disaster-re...

Over the last decade, the U.S. federal government has increasingly turned to spatially targeted tax incentives to promote postdisaster revitalization. The logic behind this policy orientation is that targeting public subsidies to particular disaster zones will speed community recovery and encourage business reinvestment. To evaluate this claim, thi...

In this paper, we draw on multi-level census data, in-depth interviews, ethnographic and Geographical Information Systems (GIS) methods to examine the effects of median household income, ethnoracial diversity, and flood damage on rates of post-Katrina repopulation in New Orleans. Our main finding is that New Orleans neighborhoods have been experien...

This paper examines the problems and limitations of the privatization of federal and local disaster recovery policies and services following the Hurricane Katrina disaster. The paper discusses the significance of the Homeland Security Act of 2002 in accelerating efforts to devolve and privatize emergency management functions; the reorganization of...

Theories of UrbanizationUrbanization and SuburbanizationMegalopolis, Exurbia, and the Multinucleated Metropolitan RegionUrbanization in Less Developed CountriesContemporary Urbanization Trends: Mega - Cities and Global CitiesReferences

Scholars currently debate the causes and consequences of the financial, housing foreclosure, and economic crises that are spreading globally to transform cities and international relations. This article develops the heuristic device crisis-policy nexus to identify and explain the policy drivers of the subprime mortgage crisis. I argue that the gene...

We investigate the impact of trauma on cross-scale interactions in order to identify the major social-ecological factors affecting the pace and trajectory of post-Katrina rebuilding in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA. Disaster and traumatic events create and activate networks and linkages at different spatial and institutional levels to provide informa...

Background/Question/Methods Traumatic anthropogenic or natural disasters can redefine the ecological and social diversity of cities, with "new normal" conditions often emerging in post-trauma urban landscapes. The objective of our ULTRA project is to examine how the pace and trajectory of recovery in post-Katrina New Orleans reflect ecological an...

This paper identifies the dominant narratives, themes, and marketing strategies that local tourism organizations and groups have used to promote racial heritage tourism in New Orleans. Drawing on ethnographic methods and qualitative data,I argue racial heritage tourism is a form of cultural production in which people construct and draw on past memo...

This paper examines the planning and staging of the 1984 Louisiana Exposition, the last world's fair in the United States, and makes comparisons with other US world's fairs, to provide insight into the sources of opposition and resistance to urban spectacles. Drawing on the work of Guy Debord and his concept of the 'society of the spectacle', this...

Disaster tourism is the circulation of people to disaster‐affected places to visually consume trauma, devastation, and catastrophe. Examples of disaster tourism include the use of guided tours to concentration camps in Germany, the World Trade Center in New York City, flooded neighborhoods in New Orleans, and war zones in Iraq and Afghanistan. Disa...

Since the classic work of Henri Lefebvre and David Harvey, the ‘secondary circuit of capital’ has been a focal point for debate among critical urban scholars. Against the background of contemporary debates on financialization, this article investigates the institutional and political roots of the subprime mortgage crisis. Empirically, the article s...

This article examines the process of post-disaster recovery and rebuilding in New York City since 9/11 and in New Orleans since the Hurricane Katrina disaster (8/29). As destabilizing events, 9/11 and 8/29 forced a rethinking of the major categories, concepts and theories that long dominated disaster research. We analyze the form, trajectory and pr...

Since Karl Marx fashioned his theory of capitalism in the nineteenth century, scholars have continually updated Marxian theory to capture the pervasiveness of commodity relations in modern society. Influenced by Georg Lukács and Henri Lefebvre, the members of the French avant-guard group, the Situationist International (1957–1972), developed an int...

This article examines the process of tourism authenticity using a case study of the rise of tourism in New Orleans during the first half of the 20th century. Tourism authenticity is a process by which tourist modes of staging, visualization, and experience shape and `frame' meanings and assertions of local culture and heritage. Empirically, I exami...

This article uses a case study of New Orleans to illustrate the nexus of commodification and rationalization in the development of urban tourism during the first half of the 20th century. Tourism is exemplary of the consumption of space and involves the circulation of people to particular locations to consume local culture, nature, history, or othe...

This article draws on primary and secondary data to provide insight into the processes and conflicts over efforts to brand New Orleans as an entertainment destination from the 1990s to the present. The author identifies the key actors and organized interests involved in branding New Orleans, the rationale and logic of branding, and marketing strate...

This paper uses the theoretical and analytical resources of critical theory to explore the processes and conflicts over efforts to present tragic events as spectacles, focusing on a case study of the Hurricane Katrina disaster in New Orleans. Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent government response have intensified uncertainty and unpredictability,...

Mardi Gras, jazz, voodoo, gumbo, Bourbon Street, the French Quarter-all evoke that place that is unlike any other: New Orleans. In Authentic New Orleans, Kevin Fox Gotham explains how New Orleans became a tourist town, a spectacular locale known as much for its excesses as for its quirky Southern charm. Gotham begins in the aftermath of Hurricane K...

Anthony J. Stanonis, Creating the Big Easy: New Orleans and the Emergence of Modern Tourism, 1918–1945. Athens and London: University of Georgia Press, 2006. 344pp. 10 photos. 3 figures. Bibliography. $59.95 hbk, $22.95 pbk - - Volume 33 Issue 3 - Kevin Fox Gotham

The author examines the U.S. real estate sector to show how the state shapes global real estate flows and networks of activity through the creation and control of liquid resources. The analysis focuses on the role of state laws and regulations in the expansion of the mort- gage-backed securities markets and the development of real estate investment...

We examine the HOPE VI and Section 8 housing programs in New Orleans, LA, to address whether they can be effective anti-poverty strategies. We conceptualize the housing system as a system of social stratification, arguing that recent policy shifts reinforce market dynamics and do not increase access to affordable housing. Our analysis suggests mark...

In this paper Kevin Fox Gotham critically explores a number of urban festivals in the US city of New Orleans, namely Mardi Gras, the Jazz and Heritage Festival, and the Essence Festival (previous articles in City have looked at similar topics—see for example Tony Harcup (Vol. 4, No. 2) in relation to Leeds, and Kim Dovey and Leonie Sandercock (Vol....

This paper examines the process of 'tourism gentrification' using a case study of the socio-spatial transformation of New Orleans' Vieux Carre (French Quarter) over the past half-century. Tourism gentrification refers to the transformation of a middle-class neighbourhood into a relatively affluent and exclusive enclave marked by a proliferation of...

Scholars currently debate whether tourism is a force of standardization that eradicates local cultures and traditions or whether tourism is a force of heterogeneity that enhances place distinctiveness. This article uses a case study of the Mardi Gras celebration in New Orleans to explain the connections between global forces and local actions in th...